1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a translation support system which supports a translation work, and, more particularly, to a translation support system, a server, a translation support method, and a recording medium, which can adequately support a sequence of translation works at the time of translating one language to another through a plurality of languages.
2. Description of the Related Art
There is a translation support system known which supports a translation work. For example, Japanese National Publication No. H8-501166 discloses a technique which restricts a vocabulary to eliminate ambiguity of texts to improve the precision of machine translation. Unexamined Japanese Patent Application KOKAI Publication No. 2001-344237 discloses a technique which encodes the mode or so of a descriptive portion in a text and translates it in multiple languages.
Those techniques are adapted not only to translation of books and documents or the like, but also to translation of various display messages (display information or the like) on products having display sections. An OA (Office Automation) apparatus, for example, has messages (terms and texts) or the like to explain operation procedures displayed on a display section (liquid crystal display section or the like). If such a message is translated according to a country or an area where the OA apparatus is to be sold, an OA apparatus adaptable worldwide can be used in each country without modifying the hardware of the OA apparatus.
As one example, Japanese makers generally employ procedures of translating a Japanese message (original language or original text) into an English message (equivalent or translated text), then translating the English message to other foreign language messages or multilingual messages (individual equivalent or translated texts).
When one language is translated to multiple languages step by step, however, the overall translation takes time and involves a troublesome work.
In specifically translating messages for an OA apparatus, the first translator translates Japanese messages into English messages in approximately one month. Then, the translated English messages are given to respective translators who in turn translate the English messages into messages in other languages in about three months. That is, the overall translation alone needs about four months.
To make such translated messages displayable on OA apparatuses, the messages should be converted to, for example, the CSV (Comma Separated Value) format before being input to the OA apparatuses.
Adequately displaying messages on a display section should clear a restriction on the length of words (the maximum number of characters or so) due to the size of the display area or the like. When a translated message exceeds the maximum number of characters, an additional correction work of, for example, adequately shortening the message is needed.